The invention concerns a medical forceps having an elongated body with two handle elements disposed at a first end of said body, movable with respect to one another and two jaw parts disposed at a second end of said body nearest the patient which jaw parts can be moved relative to one another by means of said handles via actuating means.
A medical forceps of this kind is known from German Utility Model G 91 15 760.9. One of the two jaw parts is configured as a rigid jaw part whose alignment is such that, together with a tube-like elongated body that connects a handle element at the end remote from the patient with the rigid jaw part at the end nearest the patient, it encloses an acute angle opening toward the end remote from the patient.
The second jaw part, which is movable with respect to the first, moves toward the tube as the jaw parts open.
A problem of the aforementioned medical forceps is that although the dimensions of the components at the end nearest the patient are as small as possible, the hooked configuration of the rigid jaw part is very awkward.
One possible application for a medical forceps of this kind is to be introduced into a human maxillary sinus in order to remove a piece of tissue, for example a cyst, therein. The end of the medical forceps nearest the patient can be introduced into the maxillary sinus through the nasal opening and an opening provided in the nasal septum (called a "window"); local anesthesia is generally sufficient in such a procedure, so that a complex operation with general anesthesia, involving opening of the maxillary sinus from outside, is not necessary.
Although the angled arrangement of the jaw parts makes it possible to apply the jaw parts to the cyst being removed and to grasp it with the opened jaw parts, the detachment process itself is nevertheless relatively difficult to perform. Once the cyst has been grasped by the jaw parts, it is more or less torn off by moving the entire forceps. Moreover it is extremely difficult, because of the hooked configuration of the forceps at the end nearest the patient, to pull it back out of the maxillary sinus, since this entails a risk that it may catch on other tissues in an undesirable manner.